


all i need is you

by ChaoticArugula



Category: Carmen Sandiego (Cartoon 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Post-Canon, Spoilers for Season 4, be warned, carmen would obviously visit graham in the hospital
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-18 18:20:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28871484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChaoticArugula/pseuds/ChaoticArugula
Summary: Graham knew that he could never be with Carmen, but he could still hope.In which Carmen visits Graham at the hospital and feelings are felt.CONTAINS HEAVY SEASON 4 SPOILERS!
Relationships: Gray | Crackle/Carmen Sandiego | Black Sheep
Comments: 23
Kudos: 215





	all i need is you

**Author's Note:**

> AAAAA THAT FINALE KILLED ME!! I was just there sobbing on the ground wow they really impaled me with that angst. ALSO MY BOY GRAHAM!! IM SO GLAD HE GOT A LOT OF SCREENTIME BUT THEY RLLY JUST HURT HIM EVERY TIME HE WAS ONSCREEN!! Anyway, I loved the season, and here is a fic because I rlly thought Carmen should’ve at least visited Graham come on.

Graham knew it was the right choice. He was never meant to be with Carmen anyway. The world had continued to shove that fact into his face over and over again, until it was as much of a fact as the sky being blue, or V.I.L.E. being a menace. 

When he was still suffering from his V.I.L.E. induced amnesia, he thought he couldn’t be with Carmen because of how interesting she was. She was some sort of superhero by the looks of it! One of the good guys, out to stop evil. And Graham was just a normal lighting tech from Sydney. The fact that Carmen even took interest in him was amazing, and Graham cherished every minute he had spent with her in New Zealand. He cherished every smile she gave him over the coffee date that came after; he cherished how she looked at him like she knew something about him that he hadn’t figured out yet. 

Well, he figured it out when A.C.M.E. put that experimental gizmo on his head, effectively pulling out all his suppressed emotions, STRONG emotions that were only forgotten because of V.I.L.E.’s meddling. He still felt the same about Carmen; his feelings were stronger even, now that he remembered their past friendship. His heart no longer fluttered like a love-sick puppy, it yearned for a best friend who had made the decision to leave. The difference now was that Graham knew she had made the right decision. 

But when she came into his cozy room in the Himalayas, telling him that it was never too late to change, Graham couldn’t help but think she was wrong. 

Because how could he change if he had chosen this path before his brain was messed up. He had chosen to become a thief out of his own free will. This was what pre-amnesia him wanted. To be the bad guy! Pre-amnesia Crackle didn’t care about whether he was hurting people, whether he was KILLING people. But now, suddenly, there was a nagging voice in his mind telling him that what he was doing was wrong. V.I.L.E. had messed with his brain, and that was the only reason that voice was there. Therefore, Graham hadn’t really changed. At least not out of his free will. Graham had chosen his path, and that path couldn’t include the elusive do-gooder Carmen Sandiego. 

Carmen Sandiego with her empathy and a heart of pure gold. Carmen Sandiego who had taken the risk because she knew V.I.L.E. was horrid. Carmen Sandiego who had left him. 

Graham could never be with Carmen. Not when everything he knew was crumbling at his feet, and the world was shaking and he didn’t know what was going on in his life anymore. He became Crackle again because he couldn’t bare change. He wasn’t capable of change was what he told himself. Even if he did change, he could never be with her. 

Then, when he didn’t change, she did. 

She became horrible, a monster, a psychopath. 

Everything that had ever made her CARMEN was stripped away from her, turning her into no more than one of Bellum’s thieving robots. No... she was more dangerous than those robots. She was more dangerous because of the human aspects of her. Her emotions that were being manipulated by the V.I.L.E. faculty were making her unstable. She had turned into someone – no something – that Graham couldn’t recognize. 

Graham no longer saw the woman he had fallen in love with in two different lives. 

He knew he couldn’t be with her, but he had to do something. He loved her, and this was the only way to get her back. 

It was a tough mission, but he had no choice but to put all of his trust in A.C.M.E. He knew they had agents who cared about Carmen too, based on how the man with the French accent and the short lady with glasses somberly stared up at the eye of Vishnu from their cruiser. There was something more to their expressions compared to the dozens of other blue coats at the site. Graham could tell that Carmen impacted their lives, just like she had done to many others. 

He needed to get her back. It seemed they were close to getting her back. A.C.M.E. was about to catch her when- 

A decoy?! 

No. 

No. 

NO. 

He ran towards the top of the building where Carmen undoubtedly had snuck to, carrying the A.C.M.E. prototype in his hands. He prayed that his adrenaline didn’t run out as he sprinted up steps to the main room, where the eye of Vishnu was being kept. His only hope was that she’d still be there. That this hadn’t all been for nothing. 

But when he forced the device onto her head, holding back his painful groans as she fought to get him off, he thought that he had an actually chance. 

She grasped her head in agony, and he could imagine the pain she must be feeling, the confusion, just as he had felt. 

He breathed for the first time in what felt like centuries, thinking that she might be coming back when- 

“You sold me out, Gray...” 

“NO! I’m trying to help!” 

He could feel the panic building in his chest as she picked up his Crackle Rod. 

“This isn’t the real you!” He protested. 

“Goodbye, Gray,” was the last thing he heard as a jolt of electricity hit his body. The pain surged through his body, shaking him like a prisoner being tortured. Then, everything went black. 

And that’s how he ended up here. In this hospital bed, thankful that he had changed his Crackle Rod not to go higher than stun mode, to avoid killing civilians on V.I.L.E.’s behalf, something he had done long before his amnesia incident. 

The A.C.M.E. chief had just left a few minutes ago, looking at him with pity when he said not to give Carmen his contact information. 

He didn’t want to give himself the chance of believing that he could be with Carmen, because it was a fact, true as day, Graham Calloway would never – COULD never end up with Carmen Sandiego. And what he had told Chief was right. Carmen didn’t need a V.I.L.E. operative like him to complicate her life. Even if it felt like being electrocuted again for him to admit it. 

“You know, I said the same thing to Player when I met you in Sydney.” 

Graham turned around faster than the speed of electricity at the sound of the familiar sweet voice. 

“I said that you didn’t need Carmen Sandiego complicating your V.I.L.E. free life,” she continued with a small smile, a smile that almost looked shy. 

Graham could feel the tears prick his eyes, spilling over before he could even realize it. 

“Carmen? You’re...you’re back,” he laughed, tears flowing down his face. It was one thing to hear Chief say she was okay and another to see her sitting right next to his hospital bed, not a trace of her brainwashed self. 

“Thank you, Gray,” she started, her voice wavering a bit. “Thank you for what you did...for almost sacrificing yourself to the monster I had become...for doing everything you could to get me back,” she paused, smiling wider, her eyes watery as well as she reached out to touch Graham’s hand. “I-I almost killed you.” 

“That wasn’t the real you,” Gray insisted, allowing her to rub circle into his palm. Gray heard her take a deep breath before she continued. 

“I know you didn’t wish to ‘complicate’ my life, but here’s the address to my mother’s orphanage, I know she would love to meet you,” Carmen said, smiling. 

“Your mother?” Graham questioned; his eyes wide. 

“Yes, I got connected to my birth mother...an A.C.M.E. agent named Julia helped trace me to her.” 

“Crikey! Carm, that’s amazing!” Graham grinned, intertwining their fingers. “How is she?” 

“She’s been... great. More than great to be honest. I feel like I finally have a normal life, but it was bittersweet having to say goodbye to my found family.” 

“Ah yes, the redheads and Shadowsan,” Graham sighed, his smile not faltering. He could tell how important they were to Carmen, and he decided not to bring up how she almost killed two of them when she was in her brainwashed state. 

“I miss them, but we keep in touch,” Carmen admitted. Graham looked into her eyes, seeing her in detail for the first time since she arrived. It wasn’t up for debate that she was in much better condition, free of whatever malice V.I.L.E. had implanted into her brain. Her smile was genuine, unlike the psychotic smile she had often worn when brainwashed. Though she seemed cautious, scared even. 

Gray knew exactly what she must be feeling. He felt it himself when she came to rescue him from Bellum’s lab; terrified of what he might do, how he might hurt her. 

He gave her a small smile, not knowing what he did to deserve having her in his life. The amazing Carmen Sandiego. He had loved her as Black Sheep, sure, but that wasn’t the type of love where he dreamt of spending his entire life with her. That wasn’t the type of love where he dreamt of holding her hand and sharing a part of his soul with her. He didn’t feel that until he met Carmen Sandiego for the first time, in Sydney. For the first time as his amnesiac self, free of any feelings of hate or betrayal that his V.I.L.E. persona had carried. He knew Carmen would never hurt him, and he couldn’t fathom that he had ever tried to hurt her. 

“I’m okay,” Graham stated, as if reading Carmen’s thoughts through her worried expressions, or the fact that the hand that had once grasped his own was now resting on the side of his face. He leaned into the touch, forgetting for a minute that he could never be with her. Forgetting that Carmen deserved someone better than him, someone with a heart full of pure goodness that could only rival hers. “And I’m glad you’re back to being one of the good guys,” he chuckled. 

He watched as her cautious smile turned into a large grin at his words as she rushed forward to give him a hug. Her grin only faltered when she heard his slight groan at the contact, pulling back quickly with a concerned expression. 

“We’re the good guys, Gray,” Carmen stated, grabbing his hand once more. “You have so much good in you; you are one of the strongest people I know.” 

Graham could feel the tears coming back. 

He would never believe her words, but her believing that he had good in him meant the world to him and more. She moved both of her hands to cup his face, pushing away the stray tears that had made their way down. 

“You are more than what they taught you to be; you choose your own path, no one else can do that for you.” 

“I-I know that know,” Gray nodded, looking into her brown eyes once more. “I...I love you, Carmen.” 

Oh no. 

He hadn’t meant to say that. 

He didn’t mean to complicate her life even more. 

He couldn’t deal with her rejection. 

Not now. Not ever. He couldn’t- 

Carmen let out a giggle and sighed, still smiling at him. 

“I love you too, Gray, but I’d be surprised if you didn’t know that by now,” she tilted her head in a playful manner before pulling his face closer to hers, softly pressing their lips together. 

The kiss was chaste and short, but Gray savored every second of it. 

Because, suddenly, being with Carmen Sandiego wasn’t a hopeless dream. 

They were here. They still had a long way to go and a lot to overcome, but right now they were here together. 

And that was all Graham needed.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed!!! I had a lot of fun writing it instead of listening to class :))
> 
> I miss Carmen Sandiego so much and it's only been a few days wow I guess I have to rewatch and sob some more >:((


End file.
